Scrutable

Because Twitter has banned API* access by most third parties, people have now been directly scraping the twitter website to get whatever they are after. This added hugely to the load on the servers. To get around that Twitter have rate limited what people could access from the website, only so downloading so many posts a day. However, apparently the web client hasn’t had its retry function reprogrammed since the rate limit was implemented. Now when it hits the limit, it gets stupid and starts to spam the twitter servers with retry requests, ten times a second. They’ve effectively got a massive Distributed Denial of Service attack that they implemented themselves. A rather large self own if there ever was one.

*being able to issue direct requests to their servers to get minimal data sets back with out all the crap you get on a full webpage.

There's also this

https://mastodon.world/@TomatoSoup/110640348545966181

Apparently tw.tter's Google hosting contract ended at midnight last night.

Elon Musk

@elonmusk
To address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation, we’ve applied the following temporary limits:

- Verified accounts are limited to reading 6000 posts/day
- Unverified accounts to 600 posts/day
- New unverified accounts to 300/day

Yes I did just check. That is genuine

dyqik wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 7:49 pm

There's also this

https://mastodon.world/@TomatoSoup/110640348545966181

Apparently tw.tter's Google hosting contract ended at midnight last night.

Sweet Flying Spaghetti Monster, how has Elon managed to remember to breath let alone become stupidly rich?

jimbob wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 7:52 pm

Elon Musk

@elonmusk
To address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation, we’ve applied the following temporary limits:

- Verified accounts are limited to reading 6000 posts/day
- Unverified accounts to 600 posts/day
- New unverified accounts to 300/day

Yes I did just check. That is genuine

Unfortunately, they didn't reprogram the clients to know about that, so they hammer on the servers until they get a response.

Ha! https://twitter.com/coldwarsteve/status ... 1zY-PW4R9w

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:05 pm

Ha! https://twitter.com/coldwarsteve/status ... 1zY-PW4R9w

Er... you know twitter links aren't working?

dyqik wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:04 pm

jimbob wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 7:52 pm

Elon Musk

@elonmusk
To address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation, we’ve applied the following temporary limits:

- Verified accounts are limited to reading 6000 posts/day
- Unverified accounts to 600 posts/day
- New unverified accounts to 300/day

Yes I did just check. That is genuine

Unfortunately, they didn't reprogram the clients to know about that, so they hammer on the servers until they get a response.

Ahem….

viewtopic.php?p=149418#p149418

My source…

https://sfba.social/@sysop408/110639435788921057

bjn wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:17 pm

dyqik wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:04 pm

jimbob wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 7:52 pm

Yes I did just check. That is genuine

Unfortunately, they didn't reprogram the clients to know about that, so they hammer on the servers until they get a response.

Ahem….

viewtopic.php?p=149418#p149418

My source…

https://sfba.social/@sysop408/110639435788921057

You mean the link I posted above your other response.

lpm wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:12 pm

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:05 pm

Ha! https://twitter.com/coldwarsteve/status ... 1zY-PW4R9w

Er... you know twitter links aren't working?

tweetdeck doesn't seem to be affected (presumably it still has access to the API)

dyqik wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:36 pm

bjn wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:17 pm

dyqik wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:04 pm

Unfortunately, they didn't reprogram the clients to know about that, so they hammer on the servers until they get a response.

Ahem….

viewtopic.php?p=149418#p149418

My source…

https://sfba.social/@sysop408/110639435788921057

You mean the link I posted above your other response.

Apologies, somehow missed it. Think I was typing mine up and you ninja’d me.

lpm wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:12 pm

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:05 pm

Ha! https://twitter.com/coldwarsteve/status ... 1zY-PW4R9w

Er... you know twitter links aren't working?

Odd, works for me when I clicked it.

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 9:38 pm

lpm wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:12 pm

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:05 pm

Ha! https://twitter.com/coldwarsteve/status ... 1zY-PW4R9w

Er... you know twitter links aren't working?

Odd, works for me when I clicked it.

I don't have a twitter account and it does not work for me.

jaap wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 10:10 pm

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 9:38 pm

lpm wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:12 pm

Er... you know twitter links aren't working?

Odd, works for me when I clicked it.

I don't have a twitter account and it does not work for me.

Likewise. I've never had a twitter account, but I follow links which are kindly curated for me by the likes of folks around here. That's broken now. I'm locked out.

My feed now looks like this: Spoiler:

Martin Y wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 10:18 pm

jaap wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 10:10 pm

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 9:38 pm

Odd, works for me when I clicked it.

I don't have a twitter account and it does not work for me.

Likewise. I've never had a twitter account, but I follow links which are kindly curated for me by the likes of folks around here. That's broken now. I'm locked out.

Ok that explains it. Latest attempt by Musk to destroy his site.

Presumably, journalism is now impossible?

dyqik wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 01, 2023 7:49 pm

There's also this

https://mastodon.world/@TomatoSoup/110640348545966181

Apparently tw.tter's Google hosting contract ended at midnight last night.

Yes, looks like what happened is:

- Google sends the bill for another year of hosting
- Musk decides to move it in house
- Depleted Twitter engineers can’t manage a seamless transition
- Twitter servers can’t cope
- Musk brings in viewing limits

El Pollo Diablo wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 6:54 am

Presumably, journalism is now impossible?

Of course not.

But IMHO without Twitter a lot of individuals will find it harder to find people to view their work. For example the Osint accounts mentioned by EACL or academics writing about current issues (which were very useful on Covid).

The demise of Twitter would probably help major news outlets such as The Guardian as people will be more likely to turn to them to get news.

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 7:43 am

El Pollo Diablo wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 6:54 am

Presumably, journalism is now impossible?

Of course not.

But IMHO without Twitter a lot of individuals will find it harder to find people to view their work. For example the Osint accounts mentioned by EACL or academics writing about current issues (which were very useful on Covid).

The demise of Twitter would probably help major news outlets such as The Guardian as people will be more likely to turn to them to get news.

And that's bad given that the Guardian are, on some issues, utterly shite.

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 8:21 am

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 7:43 am

El Pollo Diablo wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 6:54 am

Presumably, journalism is now impossible?

Of course not.

But IMHO without Twitter a lot of individuals will find it harder to find people to view their work. For example the Osint accounts mentioned by EACL or academics writing about current issues (which were very useful on Covid).

The demise of Twitter would probably help major news outlets such as The Guardian as people will be more likely to turn to them to get news.

And that's bad given that the Guardian are, on some issues, utterly shite.

The problem with journalism is that it’s based upon generalists submitting copy to tight deadlines. They will try to interview specialists but even so they’re going to get some things very wrong.

When it works Twitter can give people direct access to specialists. That includes everyone from people with relevant PhDs through self taught experts to those with direct lived experience.

Though of course Twitter has been highly dysfunctional both in terms of the level of abuse targeted at users (especially women) and Musk’s ongoing incompetence.

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 9:31 am

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 8:21 am

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 7:43 am

Of course not.

But IMHO without Twitter a lot of individuals will find it harder to find people to view their work. For example the Osint accounts mentioned by EACL or academics writing about current issues (which were very useful on Covid).

The demise of Twitter would probably help major news outlets such as The Guardian as people will be more likely to turn to them to get news.

And that's bad given that the Guardian are, on some issues, utterly shite.

The problem with journalism is that it’s based upon generalists submitting copy to tight deadlines. They will try to interview specialists but even so they’re going to get some things very wrong.

Yes, and it's particularly bad these days with the collapse of local journalism. We used to worry about "parachute journalism" where journalists with no knowledge of an area would turn up and write an article fitting their narrative expectations, well now we have that but without the turning up part, trying to create multiple articles per day from a desk. It results in a lot of recycling of narrative, and not much useful information. The Guardian's no worse than any other outfit on this.

Though there can also be problems - and again the Guardian's no worse than most papers on this - where activist enthusiasm is mistaken for knowledge.

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 10:51 am

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 9:31 am

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 02, 2023 8:21 am

And that's bad given that the Guardian are, on some issues, utterly shite.

The problem with journalism is that it’s based upon generalists submitting copy to tight deadlines. They will try to interview specialists but even so they’re going to get some things very wrong.

Yes, and it's particularly bad these days with the collapse of local journalism. We used to worry about "parachute journalism" where journalists with no knowledge of an area would turn up and write an article fitting their narrative expectations, well now we have that but without the turning up part, trying to create multiple articles per day from a desk. It results in a lot of recycling of narrative, and not much useful information. The Guardian's no worse than any other outfit on this.

Though there can also be problems - and again the Guardian's no worse than most papers on this - where activist enthusiasm is mistaken for knowledge.

Certainly, and lots of skills are needed to distinguish between genuine knowledge or expertise and someone writing something that seems plausible.

If you are just willing to see a tweet, or are looking for the timeline of a user, you can use:

https://publish.twitter.com/

The trick is that embedding still works.
It is far from perfect, because you can not access the replies of the tweet, and for a timeline, you only see the last 20 or so tweets on the timeline of the user you are looking for.

Musk is trying to sue the law firm that the previous owners used to force him to honour his offer to buy Twitter.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/07/elon-mu ... -fee-.html

I'm sure that is going to go well.